Was there really a Flaming Ship of Ocracoke, and was there a secret brotherhood on Ocracoke Island whose members drank from a cup fashioned from Blackbeard’s skull?
Judge Charles Whedbee (1911-1990) began his entertaining and literary career with an early-morning television show in Greenville, North Carolina, where he often recounted Outer Banks legends, many of which he heard as a child while visiting Nags Head. Whedbee eventually gathered some of the stories into a 1966 collection of stories that were published as Legends of the Outer Banks. This collection of eighteen stories included three related to Ocracoke: Old Quork, The Phantom Schooner, and Word from the Sea, all based on traditional island history and lore. The book was so successful that it went through three printings in its first year. Several more volumes followed, including The Flaming Ship of Ocracoke & Other Tales of the Outer Banks, published in 1971, and Blackbeard’s Cup and Stories of the Outer Banks, published in 1989.
In The Flaming Ship of Ocracoke Whedbee recounts the story of a shipload of wealthy Palatines who were fleeing England to escape the War of the Spanish Succession (1701-1714). They were on their way to New Berne in eastern North Carolina, the colony recently established by the Swiss Baron Christoph de Graffenried. As Whedbee tells it, on the night of the new moon in September, while anchored just inside Ocracoke Inlet, the ship’s captain and crew murdered their passengers and stole their money and valuables. Their ill deed completed, the captain and crew set the ship on fire and rowed away in the longboat. Suddenly, the “inferno ship” manned by the souls of the murdered crew “bore down upon the frantically fleeing longboat,” crashed into the boat and killed all of the murder-robbers. According to Whedbee, “to this day, they say, that flaming ship reappears on the first night of the new moon in September….” “So far as can be told,” he adds, “the flaming ship will continue to sail her fiery course each year while those betrayed pilgrims continue to look for peace and happiness in that new home to which they came so near.”
Tellingly, Whedbee never reveals the name of the ship, the date of the dramatic event, or any other detail to substantiate his story. In fact, no one on Ocracoke ever heard the story until Whedbee’s book was published. It is a wonderful story, full of excitement and drama. Read it and enjoy. And at the time of the next new moon in September, if you are on the island, be sure to set your gaze on the inlet…but don’t be disappointed if you don’t spy the flaming ship.
In his 1989 book, Blackbeard’s Cup and Stories of the Outer Banks, Charles Whedbee claimed to have participated in a secret ritual at “Blackbeard’s Castle” on Ocracoke Island. He writes that in the early 1930’s he was invited to share in the ritual and actually drank a libation from a silver-plated shallow bowl fashioned from the top half of the pirate’s skull. He reports that the vessel bore the curse, “Deth to Spotswoode,” engraved on the rim. Although it is an entertaining story, it never happened. The tale of furtive meetings, solemn rituals, and secret passwords is completely fabricated, the product of an imaginative writer’s active mind, not a true account of the lives of native Ocracoke Islanders.
To read more about Blackbeard’s skull click on the image below to be directed to our July 2004 Newsletter:
Again, enjoy the story, but keep in mind that Whedbee liked to tell people that his stories were of three kinds: those he knew to be true, those he believed to be true, and those he fabricated. But despite much prodding, he never revealed which were which.
Now you know about two of them.